Arthur Hardy, founder of the Mardi Gras guide, told me recently something that excellently sums up the looming security challenges for Mardi Gras 2025.
He said that a guy walking down the street, wearing a mask, and dragging an ice chest — that’s pretty much Mardi Gras. During Carnival season, that’s something you see all day, every day.
Yet, that’s the profile of Shamsud-Din Jabbar, the man who planted bombs throughout the French Quarter before carrying out a terror attack on New Year's Day.
As we approach Mardi Gras in the wake of the terror attack, security officials are scrambling to make safe an event that’s known as the greatest party on earth.
This task leaves many questions on our minds: Is that even possible? How can you pick out suspicious behavior in a sea of costumes and revelry?
These are the questions still being ironed out by city, state, and, now, federal officials ever since President Biden designated Mardi Gras with a SEAR-1 rating following the Bourbon Street Terror attack.
One of those close to and active in these conversations about enhancing security is NOLA City Councilman JP Morrell.
In our Monday interview, I got a chance to ask if we know yet what to expect in terms of how Mardi Gras might look different this year.
“We don’t know exactly how different it's going to look,” Morrell explained. “But what I’ve been telling everyone is that there’s going to be substantial changes with this SEAR-1 rating…Once you get a recommendation on a federal level on how to make it safer—how do you not make it safer?... Those experts are coming in as we speak.”
Morrell explained that we can expect the framework used for the Super Bowl to be largely applied to Mardi Gras, “If you were downtown during the Super Bowl, you see the drones, officers, and military presence—that’s what you’ll see during Mardi Gras.”
What does this mean in terms of practical measures? It’s a bit too soon to say for sure. But we'll know soon enough.
Morrell speculates, “It’s going to affect how long our routes are and where they’ll start and begin… As far as the day-to-day experience of catching beads and coconuts, that won’t change. But the routes themselves and whose on that route will likely change.”
We also touched on the City Council’s investigation into the permanent security infrastructure on Bourbon Street.
However, it’s important to note that this investigation is different than the one launched by Attorney General Liz Murrill.
“There’s Attorney General Liz Murrill’s investigation happening right now, which is looking specifically into the operational deployment of safety measures during New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day,” said Morrell. “This is specifically being looked at from a law enforcement perspective.”
“Then there’s the City Council’s investigation dealing with infrastructure that was supposed to be there,” Morrell explained. "This looks at the timeline that it was supposed to be completed by, why it wasn’t installed in a timely or proper manner, why what was installed wasn’t sufficient, and why there was so much money wasted on useless equipment. This one is focused on permanent infrastructure because that deals with city and taxpayer dollars, which falls under the purview of the City Council… We’re looking into how we ended up with millions of dollars worth of bollards that couldn’t stop a Go-Kart.”
